


Outside This Place

by trustno1



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, mulder is a nerd
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-28
Updated: 2014-07-15
Packaged: 2018-02-06 15:34:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1863102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trustno1/pseuds/trustno1
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dana Scully is a forensic science major at the University of Virgina whose world consists of her leather jacket, her walkman, and her studies. Until she meets Fox Mulder, a junior studying psychology who drags her into a life full of unsolved mysteries, Elvis Presley mixtapes, and the possibility of life outside the Earth they know.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Ugliest Sweater She Had Ever Seen

Standing five foot three, five foot six in her combat boots, Dana Scully struck a determined figure in the center of the University of Virginia quad. The sweltering heat of the last days of summer made itself present in the sweat beading on the back of her neck, which wasn’t helped by the leather jacket and thick tights. Okay Dana, she thought to herself, adjusting her skirt in a manner that was only slightly awkward as she tried to balance a cardboard box under her arm. This is the last one. Just get this box up to your room and you’ll be officially moved in. Technically speaking, she had been living in her dorm room for two weeks now, but she hadn’t felt entirely at home without the few crucial items that one cardboard box contained. Her parents had brought it when they came down that day after she phoned requesting some things she had left behind at home, and she had bid goodbye to them (and her disinterested looking sister) earlier that morning.  
The chaos of the campus’s center had quieted down considerably since the first day Dana had arrived, and now there were only a few booths set up advertising enrollment in various student organizations and activities ranging from ultimate frisbee to the GSA to a Film Appreciation Club. She rushed along the walkway, hurrying to get out of the unforgiving sunlight as she felt the sweat begin to drip on her fair cheeks. Dana reached the doors of dorm building but once she was inside she realized that she didn’t know where to go. She had never entered from this side before. She looked to the signs beside the staircases that were to her left and right. The one on the left read “100’s” and the one on the right read… “500’s?” She looked back and forth between the two. She was in 416. And she had no clue where to go. Dana stood there, sweltering her jacket and feeling very anxious and incredibly confused in her heat induced haze when she heard a voice ask, “First day?”  
She turned and saw a tall boy leaning against the vending machine and eating something out of a package as he watched her. He was doing this all while wearing the ugliest sweater Dana had ever seen. It was navy blue and printed with little cartoon alien faces, which were an appalling shade of neon green. She was so busy staring at the ugly sweater that she almost missed his question. “What? Oh-” she stammered then looked up at his face, slightly unkempt and clearly amused, but with eyes that weren’t unkind. Rather, they seemed interested. In her. “Um...” she continued, gathering her thoughts while the boy stood there, crunching away and awaiting her response. “No. I’ve been here for a couple weeks. I just think I…” She trailed off, looking down at her box and then at the staircases again.  
The boy walked closer to her and she resisted the urge to step back. “What room are you in?” he asked. She told him and he nodded quickly, as if it had been the exact answer he was expecting. “See, this building used to be only 400’s and 500’s. Then they built an expansion back in the seventies. They built 100-250 on as the left wing, and left the numbers in the right wing the same,” he explained, pushing his glasses further up on his nose. “Everybody gets confused when they first get here.” He tossed some more of his snack into his mouth. “So…there are 150 rooms that don’t exist?” Dana asked, shifting her weight to the side and her box to her other arm. Snack Guy raised his eyebrows and held up his hand. “Exactly. People will tell you it’s some university bigshot boo-boo, but that’s still yet to be determined,” he said. She felt her brow crease in contemplation and toyed with the cross around her neck while he stood there, clearly with no intention to leave any time soon. “Do you live here?” Dana finally asked. “I haven’t seen you before.” He laughed and the sound nearly made her jump.  
“No, no. I’m a junior. I live off campus. I got out of these dorms as soon as possible. And I’d advise you to do the same,” he added. “Then why are you here?” she asked. He held up his package of food. “This is the only vending machine on campus that stocks sunflower seeds,” he said, and knocked on the machine for good measure. “I’ll see you around, Agent Orange.” He strolled past her and out the door, sunflower seeds in hand, and left her touching her hair absentmindedly and wondering if it really was more orange than red.  
Dana had met her roommate the day after she arrived and the girl had seemed pleasant enough, but Dana quickly found out that she wasn’t going to be around most of the time when she took off with her boyfriend before their RA had even started the first week icebreakers. Which left Dana practicing trust falls in the lounge room on her own. Sure enough, the room was empty when she went to bed after unpacking her beloved cardboard box on the day of her encounter with Snack Boy, and she found herself alone yet again when she woke up the falling morning. And each morning after. And then classes started and she started seeing the person she was supposed to be sharing a room with a little more often, but even then it was only to nap or grab something to eat. Dana could never seem to make conversation with her. Instead, she did what she had always done, and threw herself into her studies. They were fairly rigorous, but she had expected as much as a forensic science major. But nothing particularly interesting happened until she was sitting in her afternoon class on a Wednesday.  
She had her notebook and pencil out and was dutifully taking notes in it, when the door opened ten minutes into the class and who should walk in but Snack Guy. And he made a beeline for her. “We meet again, Agent Orange,” he whispered in her ear before plopping down in the seat next to her. “I told you we would.” Oh, please don’t let everyone think I’m with the guy who came in late, Dana thought. He took out a tape recorder, placed it on the table it front of him, and pressed the record button. So he was one of those students. Even worse. And she noticed that he was wearing an even uglier sweater than the last time she saw him, this time an eggplant colored knitwear number with a large green spaceship on the front. Dana did her best to ignore him and continued writing furiously. He leaned over to her. “I like your jacket,” he whispered.   
“You’re not the first person to tell me that, you know,” she said out of the corner of her mouth. “Yeah. I thought so. But I still wanted to tell you,” Snack Guy said. For a second she almost thought he was going to reach out and put his hand on her shoulder, to touch the silver spikes on them. “You’re one to talk, anyway,” she whispered, because she could feel his eyes on her, burning a hole through the leather. “With those sweaters you wear. What’s your name anyway, Alien Bill Cosby?” He laughed and this time Dana did jump and almost drop her pencil. “That’s funny,” he said. “It’s not, though. It’s Mulder. That’s my last name, but everybody calls me that. My first name’s Fox. Spelled like the animal. You know, the one that’s orange like your hair,” he said, and she didn’t have to turn to see the smile on his face. And she knew he could see the one on hers.  
“Okay Mulder,” she said quietly. “But could you not talk so loud? Some of us have actual notes to take. Writing helps you retain things better than just listening to them, by the way.” Mulder shook his head, still grinning. “What are you worried about, Agent Orange?” he asked, leaning closer to her. “That I’m going to get you in trouble with the professor? This isn’t like high school, by the way.” Dana raised her eyebrows, never once taking her eyes off the paper in front of her. “That’s exactly what I’m worried about, actually. I’d like to make a good impression,” she explained. “And I wish you’d stop calling me that.” Mulder scoffed. “A good impression. That’s admirable. I could stop calling you that if I knew your name. Since you know mine now.” He had leaned back in his chair now, and for a second Dana thought he was going to put his feet up on the table. “It’s Dana,” she said.   
“Your last name,” Mulder persisted.   
She was caught off guard and paused for a beat, almost unsure if she should trust this sweater clad stranger. “Scully,” she answered. “Okay Scully,” he said, almost imitating her. “What’s your major? Since that’s first question you’re supposed to ask people you meet at college, if you’re so insistent on playing by the books.” Dana sighed. “I really don’t have time for this, I mean, we’re in the middle of class, Mulder. And what are you doing in this class anyway? I thought you said you were a junior.”  
“I’m a psych major, Scully,” Mulder said, as if that explained everything. “I’ve gotta have a few classes to fill up my schedule. And it’s a class on American romanticism, it’s not like it’s some kind of exclusive club. Besides, I hold a torch for Melville.” That almost made her pause again. He produced a bag of sunflower seeds from somewhere and started crunching on them. “Is that all you eat?” Dana asked, slightly annoyed though for some reason she found this trait almost endearing. “Pretty much,” Mulder replied. Then he stood up, snack still in hand, and headed for the door. “Do me a favor and pick up my tape recorder for me when the lecture’s over, will you?”   
Dana’s jaw dropped, unable to believe that he was just walking out in the middle of a class. “But how am I supposed to get it back to you?” she hissed, although trying to keep quiet was basically pointless now. He waved at her, and Dana realized that the students sitting around them had been watching them the whole time. She blushed instantly. “Don’t try to find me, I’ll find you,” Mulder said. “Remember: the truth is out there, Scully.” And then he was gone, leaving her with sweaty palms, page after page of hastily written notes, and a tape recorder that probably contained more of a conversation about aliens and last names than it did a lecture.


	2. Two Pairs of Glasses

Dana had hoped that the heat would maybe relent but by the time the next week had rolled around, it was still sweltering outside. So she had to forgo her favorite jacket and instead decide to attempt to embrace the weather by sitting outside on a bench with black painted fingernails and a book in hand. Of course, the sweat forming on the tip of her nose made the experience severely less enjoyable. She was pondering whether or not it was really worth it to sit outside and get heatstroke under the guise of enjoying nature when she heard a voice that made her look up. 

Mulder stood a few yards away, talking to some older students. She almost didn’t recognize him because he had forgone his hideous sweaters in favor of a light turquoise shirt with the sleeves rolled up. As he stood there, arms folded over his chest and a grin on his face, Dana’s mind instantly went to the tape recorder, tucked into her black canvas backpack that sat beside her on the bench. She started to stand to approach him before remembering his words – “don’t try to find me, I’ll find you.” She wondered if that was a joke and if she should walk over to him anyway. Because she had already discovered most of the time she couldn’t tell what was a joke to Mulder and what wasn’t. Dana didn’t have to think about this for very long, tough, because he had just bid goodbye to his friends when he turned around and spotted her. “What’s up, Scully,” he called out as he walked over to her. “I told you I’d find you.” He smiled and pushed his sunglasses on top of his head to reveal that he was wearing his regular glasses underneath. 

“Why are you wearing two pairs of glasses,” she said, more of a statement than a question.

“Why are you wearing only one pair of glasses,” he threw back at her, taking his sunglasses off his head completely and putting them in his shirt pocket.

“I only need mine to read,” she replied, smiling now. “I see you’re not wearing one of your sweaters today either.” Mulder shook his head at her. “It’s August, Scully,” he said. “No one wears sweaters every day in August.” Dana looked down at her purple and red flannel and wondered if maybe no one wore flannels in August either. “I have your tape recorder,” she said at last, looking up to meet his eyes. She grabbed her backpack and unzipped it, digging around amidst the pens and loose cassette tapes inside. “Rad,” said Mulder. She retrieved it and handed it to him but he didn’t walk away. They stood there, eye to eye, with Dana clutching her book in one hand and her backpack in the other, in silence. “You never told me what your major was,” he blurted out. “I told you that that’s one of the questions you’re gonna have to answer around here.” She raised her eyebrows and slung her backpack over one shoulder. “It’s forensic science.” Mulder crossed his arms and pursed his lips, looking impressed. “So it’s Dr. Scully then?” He smiled.

“Not even close to that yet,” Dana said. “I should get through my first month of school first at least. And it’s hard to do that when I have strange guys chasing after me to hunt down their tape recorders, you know.” Mulder chuckled. “Come to a party with me tonight,” he said.

“What,” said Dana.

“There’s a party at the Phi Kappa Pi house tonight and I want you to come with me,” he repeated. “Mulder, I’m still getting settled in. I have class tomorrow. I need to study,” she trailed off a list of reasons that even she wasn’t sure if she believed in. “What about your punk credibility?” Mulder asked. “Studying isn’t very punk, Scully.” She clutched her book to her chest and rolled her eyes at him. “I have better things to do than go to a frat party,” she said. “But it’s not just a frat party. It’s a party at the Phi Kappa Phi house. The only frat house on campus with a ghost in one of its mirrors,” explained Mulder.

Dana stared at him. “Are you joking? A ghost? There’s a ghost in the mirror at the fraternity house. Like Bloody Mary.” The deadpan expression on her face told him that she was having just a little bit of difficulty believing him. “Yes, exactly like Bloody Mary. And what happens when you stick a bunch of college kids in a house with a haunted mirror? They wanna play that stupid sleepover game where you try to bring the ghost out of the mirror,” Mulder went on, visibly growing more impassioned by the second. “Mulder, you’re asking me to go with you, a person I barely know, to a random frat house to track down some allegedly haunted mirror.” He nodded. “Yes. That’s exactly what I’m asking you to do. I wanna go check it out and I want you to come with me.” Dana sighed and rubbed her forehead with her hand. “Don’t you have friends that could help you out with this? Why are you asking me?” Mulder scoffed. “Yeaaaaah I have friends. But I don’t want to this with them. I want to do this with you. Because you seem cool. And you know my last name and that I like sunflower seeds and wear awesome sweaters so you don’t ‘barely know’ me, okay.” 

Dana smiled up at him. “Okaaaaaay,” she sighed. Mulder clapped his hands together, clearly pleased. “Great,” he exclaimed. “I’ll pick you up at seven, Scully.” He turned around and started jogging away, making Dana suddenly feel embarrassed for him and the dorky image he created. Then she became aware of what she had just agreed to. “MULDER!” she called out after him. “Are you actually taking me to go investigate a haunted mirror?”  
But he was already halfway across the park.

When she found herself back in her dorm room, she briefly contemplated changing for the party. But then she realized that there would probably be little socializing to do with Mulder dragging her off to go explore the supposed haunted mirror. And she wouldn’t want to talk to anyone there in the first place, other than Mulder. She was wearing her flannel when she went downstairs at a quarter to seven and found him leaning up against the vending machine and eating sunflower seeds, just as she had seen him that first day. 

“Ready to roll?” he asked, stuffing the pack of sunflower seeds in the pocket of the brown blazer he wore over the shirt from earlier that day. “Ready as I’ll ever be, I guess,” Dana said, looking down at her boots. “I’m still not entirely sure of what I’m being put up to here. I’d like some more details about this whole ‘haunted mirror’ thing. And why I need to be the one who goes with you.” Mulder had been watching her with a complacent smile on his face as he talked, and he looked straight into her eyes as he asked her, “Do you believe in aliens, Scully?”

“What?” she cried, throwing her hands up in exasperation. “You’re completely ignoring my questions, Mulder. Why, do you believe in aliens?”

“Of course,” he answered. “But I was asking you, not the other way around.”

“I don’t…I don’t know…” Dana trailed off. “It’s okay not to know,” he said. “It’s only bad if you don’t know things and choose not to explore them. But I can tell you have interest. I can tell you believe, even if it’s only a little bit.”

Dana looked at him, a crease forming on her forehead as she thought this over. “How do you know?” she questioned. “You’re here,” Mulder told her. “That’s all the proof I need.”

And this time Dana knew he wasn't joking.


	3. Dr. Scully

On the way to the house, Mulder elaborated more on the mirror. It had been brought into the house decades ago by a president on the fraternity. The spirit trapped inside was allegedly a house member who had died in a small fire during the seventies. “I’ve always wanted to find out if the stories were true, like I believe they are, but I never had anybody to check it out with,” he explained. “So that’s where I come in,” said Dana.

“Yes,” Mulder replied. “You’re young and adventurous and smart. Or you seem like you are. Plus you look cool enough to belong at a frat party.” She rolled her eyes at the last part but couldn’t help feeling vaguely flattered, even if this wasn’t a crowd she was really looking to fit in with. Dana didn’t have to ask how much longer the walk would be because she could instantly tell when they were on sorority row. The massive houses of brick and white siding were draped with banners advertising various events hosted by each sorority or fraternity. The entire street seemed to be lit up like candles lined up on a church altar. She didn’t stop to marvel at them, though, and instead pushed past streams of students meandering along the sidewalk so that she could keep up with Mulder. She nearly ran into him when he came to a stop in front of an especially large and ostentatious red brick house. The sounds of a song that had been popular a few years back could be heard among the laughter and shouts, its bass booming through the walls. _Don’t call it a comeback, I been here for years, rockin’ my peers and putting suckas in fear._ Mulder was rocking on the balls of his feet, biting his lip in excitement and, Dana thought quite possibly, fear. “This is it,” he said, and pushed the door open.

The foyer was filled with people, dancing low and slow, talking, laughing, sipping from colorful plastic cups. They looked almost out of place in the room with its exquisite wood paneling and ornate rugs. Dana froze, unsure of where to go from there. She turned to ask Mulder where they were supposed to go and discovered that he wasn’t beside her, but standing at a table in the center of the room instead. She nudged her way through the party guests, muttering “excuse me’s” and “sorry’s” as she went. “Mulder, were you even invited to this party?” she asked when she finally stood beside him. He had peeled off two red name tags from a sheet on the table and was writing on them with a black marker. “Of course not,” he replied without looking up. “Besides, I don’t think this is the party you get an invitation in the mail for, Scully.” Dana raised her eyebrows and folded her arms over her chest. “Then are you even friends with anybody here?” she demanded. “That’s a big nope too,” he said, still writing. She groaned. “When you asked me to go to a party with you, I assumed you at least had already been asked to come. I didn’t think we were going to be crashing a frat party. This was not on my agenda, Mulder.” As she was talking, Mulder stuck one of the nametags to his blazer and after she had finished he pressed the other to her shirt. She stared at his. Etched in black ink was a single word in capital letters: “SPOOKY.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dana questioned. He pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Remember when I told you that everyone called me Mulder?” he asked. She nodded. “That was a lie. Some people, uh…they call me Spooky. Because I do stuff like this. Because I crash frat parties to track down a haunted mirror. And because I believe in aliens. So they call me Spooky Mulder.” He looked down at his feet and bit his lip. “I don’t think it’s meant to be a nice nickname, but I just embrace it, you know?” Dana felt a pang in her chest. “Mulder-“ she started to say but he interrupted her and placed his hand on her shoulder. “This is a very heartfelt moment we’re having here, Scully, and I’m enjoying it a lot, but we have a ghost to track down.” Then he turned and moved through the crowd and away from her, to another hallway. Dana looked down at the nametag he had stuck to her chest. Even though it was upside down to her, she could still read what it said. _Dr. Scully._

She turned, lips parted slightly, then took after him down the hall. There were staggering boys in sideways caps and people kissing and touching as they leaned up against the walls, but she focused only on Mulder. They both came to a stop in front of a door on the left side. Dana looked at him. He nodded at her. This was what the night had been leading up to. Beyond this door was the mirror, with the ghost of a student who had died in a part of this house that no longer existed. Dana realized at that moment that she believed in this. She believed in the possibility of a spirit trapped in a world beyond her own, who lived inside a mirror. And even more than that, she believed in Mulder. So when he opened the bathroom door, she was the first to step through.

For some reason, Dana had expected it to be dark inside. But instead it was brightly lit by fluorescent bulbs that showed a slightly dingy but relatively normal bathroom decorated in shades of pale yellow and mint green. And there was the mirror, surrounded by a dinged silver fame, hanging right above the porcelain sink. She stood there and stared at it as Mulder scooched inside and shut the door behind them. Dana frowned as she looked the mirror over, scanning every detail intently. It looked just like every other bathroom mirror she had seen before. “Are you sure this is the right one?” she asked Mulder. He nodded, moving to stand beside her. “Then what are we supposed to do?” She crossed her arms and looked over at him. Mulder scratched the back of his head and frowned.

“The, uh, the name of the student that died was James Winter. So what if we tried saying his name three times like you do with Bloody Mary?” he suggested. “I thought the whole point of this was to _not_ play slumber party games in the bathroom,” Dana pointed out. He flipped the lights off and a chill crept over her skin, making her shiver. She began to realize that she may actually be scared of what was possibly about to happen. “No, Scully, the point of this is to stop _other_ people from playing slumber party games in the bathroom.” She felt his presence directly behind her and started chewing on her bottom lip. “After all,” Mulder said. “They’re not nearly as prepared as we are.”

The room was warm and cramped and Dana could hear her own breathing in the dark. Her eyes started to adjust and she became hyperaware of everything in the bathroom. Namely, Mulder standing behind her. “James Winter,” he pronounced in a loud, clear voice. He was looking directly at the mirror. “James Winter, James Winter.” Then everything was quiet. And nothing happened. They both continued to stare at the mirror, but they saw and heard nothing except for the muffled roar of the party outside the door. After it seemed like forever had passed, and Dana began to wonder if someone was going to come banging on the door to actually use the bathroom, she turned to him and whispered, “I don’t think anything’s going to happen, Mulder.” He was still looking at the mirror. “I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” he said. She turned around and nearly recoiled in shock. Inside the mirror was a silvery silhouette of a person, with few discernable facial features and it seemed to be fading in and out, but nonetheless it was definitely a person. And it seemed to be reaching its hand out to both of them.

“Mulder-“ Dana stammered, eyes widening. “Mulder, what are we supposed to do? Mulder-“ The last time she called his name it had barely left her mouth when Mulder lunged forward, pushing her out of the way and punched the center of the mirror, cracking it and causing the apparition to disappear. Dana stood there, mouth open and eyes round as the moon glowing outside. Mulder was clutching his hand and trying to catch his breath. He turned to her and cracked a smile. “I think I just gave us thirteen years of bad luck, Scully.” She stared at him for a moment, and then burst into laughter. The situation was still grave but he had somehow made it seem like this was a normal party activity. Dana was still laughing when she reached over and turned the light on.

That was when she saw his hand. He was trying to cover it up but she could still see the blood running down his palm. Dana’s laughter quickly faded and returned to fear at the sight of the injury. “Mulder, we have to get you to a hospital,” she said. He winced, still holding his hand as his face blanched. “No, we have to bury a shard from the mirror first,” Mulder protested. “It’s the only way to keep the spirit from coming back into the house.” Dana grabbed a washcloth from a rack on the wall and ran it under warm water in the sink. “We have to do it later, you need to get this taken care of,” she insisted. She gently took his hands and started washing the blood away from them. “No, we can’t. We only have an hour after we break the mirror to bury the piece, otherwise the spirit goes free and becomes ten times harder to catch,” Mulder explained. Dana groaned and grabbed two more washcloths. She wrapped one around the gash on his hand and wrapped her hand with the other while she gently wiggled a decent sized shard of glass from the broken mirror. Then she looked Mulder in the eye and said, “Take me to where I need to bury it.”

They made quite a picture when they burst from the bathroom, Mulder pushing through the party to get to the back door with one still slightly blood hand and Dana hurrying after him and wielding the shard of glass. Mulder opened the door and ran out into the backyard, nearly tripping over a branch, and then skidding cartoonishly to a stop in front of a patch of black dirt. “Here,” he declared, pointing with his good hand. “We have to bury it on the property where he died.” Dana dropped to her knees and started digging with her hands. Her fingernails sunk into the cold earth, scraping and throwing the soil behind her. “That’s good,” Mulder said when the hole had reached a considerable depth. Dana gingerly picked up the glass shard from where it had been wrapped in the washcloth and dropped it down into the ground. She took the dirt she had dug up and began piling it on top until it was gone and the patch looked almost identical to the way it had been before she disturbed it. “Is that all we need to do?” she asked, still staring down at the dirt. “Yeah,” said Mulder. “That’s it.” He was watching her with an expression that was part gratefulness and part concern. Dana rose to her feet and brushed off her hands. She looked up at him. “Now, let’s see about your hand.”

They sat together on the dewy grass out in the yard, neither one of them wanting to linger in the bathroom where Dana had raided the shelves for cotton balls, rubbing alcohol, and band-aids. Mulder was cross legged with her sitting across from him, legs tucked underneath her as she dabbed at the gashed areas around his knuckles. “You’re lucky you don’t need stitches,” she chastised him. “You really should have been more careful.” She pressed a few bandages onto his hand and then sat back. “You should put some antibiotic ointment on there every day until they heal, or else it’s going to scar,” Dana said as she screwed the top back on the bottle of rubbing alcohol. “Thanks, Dr. Scully,” Mulder said, smiling almost sheepishly. He looked down at his hand and everything was quiet for a while, until Dana reached into the pocket of her flannel shirt and took out a pack of cigarettes.

As she was lighting one, Mulder looked over to her, eyebrows raised in surprise. “Those things are supposed to kill you, you know,” he said. “You should know that if you’re going to be a doctor.” Dana rolled her eyes. “I only smoke when I’ve got something on my mind,” she said, a faint smile on her face as she pulled her knees up to her chest. “What do you have on your mind, then?” Mulder asked, watching her in interest. “Tonight? The party? Burying a piece of glass in the backyard of a frat house to keep a ghost from coming back and tormenting everyone?” She glanced over at him, still smiling, and took a drag of her cigarette. “I’m just wondering why you would want to do that. Smash the mirror and get rid of the ghost. That’s what’s on my mind,” she explained. He nodded slowly. “His soul was trapped. His spirit was. It was trapped in that mirror and I felt like, if he could be free, and away from everything, then why shouldn’t he be?” Mulder said. Dana sat there, still in thought. “That’s very virtuous of you,” she said after a long silence. He laughed and she turned to look at him. “Do you think I’m spooky, Scully?” he asked her, the creases by his eyes from long nights of studying and hunting down paranormal activity and God knows what else visible through the lenses of his glasses. She looked at him as he sat there expectantly, rumpled blazer and mussed up hair, with one bandaged hand, and she wondered if he really wanted an answer.

“I don’t know, Mulder,” said Scully. “I don’t know what I think right now.” 


	4. You Are What You Eat

  Fox Mulder was crossing through the McCormick Hall cafeteria, sunflower seeds in hand, when he spotted a familiar figure in a denim jacket and combat boots, hunched over a bowl of cornflakes. He made a beeline for the table and took a seat beside her. “Good morning, Scully,” he chirped, and folded his arms on the table. She didn’t look up, but instead kept stirring through her cereal with a spoon. “Why are you here?” Scully asked dryly. She let the milk drip off of her spoon and back into the bowl, eyebrows furrowed.

“Because you were sitting here playing with your breakfast and I saw you and wanted to say hello,” Mulder said. “That’s what friends do, you know.” At that Scully smiled and finally looked up at him. “I’m really tired right now, okay?” She mumbled as she ran a hand through her hair. Mulder shook his head and grinned. “See, I’m a psych major, I don’t have that problem,” he said. She laughed and the look on his face seemed almost proud, although he did very much have that problem. But it was definitely for different reasons than Scully had hers. “Hurry up and either eat those cornflakes or dump ‘em because I have someone I want you to meet. Please.” He added the last word when he saw Scully cock an eyebrow as she watched him out of the corner of her eye. “Mulder, I’m eating my breakfast,” she protested and dropped her spoon back into the bowl. He looked at his watch. “Well seeing as it’s currently 11:02 AM, you should probably call that brunch, Scully.” She rolled her eyes and stood up to put her bowl in its appropriate bin, Mulder trailing after her.

“Okay, you’ve made your point,” she said as she poured out the remains of her milk and cereal. “But who exactly are you taking me to meet?” Mulder smiled down at her and stuck his hands into the pockets of his khakis. “That’s a surprise,” he said. Scully crossed her arms over her chest and sighed at him. “We’re not going ghosthunting again, are we? Because I have an assignment I’d like to get finished without having to worry about being attacked by the spirits of vengeful frat boys,” she pointed out. “And you’re being very-”

“Spooky?” he interrupted her with the suggestion.

She paused, the chatter of the other students in the dining hall a muffled roar around her, and felt her cheeks turn warm. “No, “ she said at last. “I was going to say stubborn.”

Scully looked past him, over his shoulder, because she could feel his eyes digging into her even though he was silent. “Okay,” Mulder said. “Let’s go.” He turned around and walked through the doorway and she followed him. They walked down the sidewalk side by side, with him whistling a faintly familiar tune. He said nothing, and neither did she, as she suddenly became afraid she had offended him in some way. But his demeanor changed when they reached the library. “This is it,” he announced, taking her by the arm and practically dragging her up the steps and inside. He didn’t even pause to look around as he jogged up a narrow staircase off to one side of the large main room and stopped in front of a door. A plaque on the door read “THE LONE GUNMEN – STUDENT PUBLICATION.”

Mulder knocked on the door and Scully heard the murmur of voices followed by footsteps on the other side. The door opened just slightly and the face of a bespectacled man with a greasy combover who was clearly older than them appeared in the crack. When he saw Mulder standing outside, the tense expression on his face relaxed. “Oh, it’s you,” he said. Then he saw Scully standing behind her and looked back to Mulder, both eyebrows raised. Mulder nodded and the man opened the door fully. When they stepped inside, Scully was taken aback by their surroundings. The desks in the room were drowning in papers and the walls were plastered with posters featuring the face of John F. Kennedy accompanied by calls to action in bold lettering.

The man who had opened the door for them stood there, and seated behind him were two younger guys. The older of the two had a full beard and neatly combed dark hair, and was wearing a sweater despite the sweltering heat. The younger had long, tangled blond hair and wore glasses with thick frames along with a T-shirt advertising a punk band that Scully was fairly familiar with. The trio was aghast at Scully’s entrance, all three staring with wide eyes and the blond with his mouth open. “Pick your jaw up off the floor, Langley. That’s how flies get in your mouth, you know,” Mulder said to him. He pointed to the man who had let them in, and in turn the other two men in the room. “Scully, this is Frohike, Byers, and of course, Langley. The Lone Gunmen. The Lone Gunmen, this is Dana Scully.”

Scully stared at The Lone Gunmen, unsure of what to do and why she was here. “They publish a radical student newspaper,” Mulder said after a period of silence. “Actually, it’s a subculture patriotic zine, thank you very much,” Byers said. “And since Frohike here isn’t exactly an active part of the student body, I doubt it should be considered a student publication at all.” Frohike scoffed. “Hey now, I’m continuing my education, alright?” he said. Byers shook his head. “Why did you bring her here, Mulder?” Langley asked, still staring at Scully. “Not that we, uh, have a problem with it, I mean.”

Mulder stepped closer to Scully and put one arm on her shoulder. “She got rid of the mirror ghost at Phi Kappa Phi,” he said. Frohike’s eyebrows shot up, Byers leaned forward in interest, and Langley gasped out a “whoa…” “Actually, I just went along to help,” Scully objected, already feeling her face begin to heat up again. “You’re the one who actually broke the mirror and…and all that…” Mulder shook his head, grinning with pride. “She did it. She didn’t run away or deny it or try to figure out a scientific explanation. She buried the piece of the mirror.” He paused. “It wouldn’t have happened without her there.” Byers turned to look at Scully, arms crossed. “Do you believe?” he asked.

It was a simple question, only three words long, and yet at the same time so complicated. She had seen something that night with her very own eyes, that she knew for sure. But accepting that it was a ghost without question went against everything she believed in. But she had _seen_ it. It was something that wasn’t human, she knew that. Maybe it was a manifestation of energy. Or maybe, quite possibly, Mulder was right. What they had experienced together in that house on that night had been something that was part of another world. “I’m skeptical,” Scully said at last.

She expected an almost hostile response from The Lone Gunmen, but instead, they burst into laughter. Mulder, on the other hand, did not. “Isn’t everyone skeptical?” Frohike said. “Listen, we hear some weird stuff coming through here all the time. Especially from this guy.” He jabbed his thumb at a still unsmiling Mulder. “But you saw things when you were in the frat house. Things that made you start thinking about stuff you never really thought about before, right? We’ve all seen things like that. If we hadn’t seen things, we wouldn’t be here right now.” Scully took a look around the room at the company she was in. These strange men with messy hair and heads full of ideas and eyes full of life, with stains on their shirts and bags under their eyes and wheels in their minds that were constantly, constantly turning. “Why am I here?” she asked. This time it was Mulder who spoke. “Because no one believes,” Mulder said. “I mean, people _do_ , but not nearly enough to actually seek it out. They wanna lie on the top of their cars in the park and look at shooting stars and call them UFOs. They wanna drink beer and point at shapes in the shadows of the trees and try to make their friends jump. But when it comes time to actually believe, they’re scared. We want to make what we did with the ghost in the mirror the other night a regular thing. I need someone who’s willing to at least consider the possibility that something might be out there. Someone who’s willing to investigate. And that’s you.”

Scully looked up at him, lips parted, unsure of what to say, when the silence was interrupted. “Well, this has been a lovely get together, but we have some work of the top secret nature to focus on,” Frohike said, clapping his hands together. “Oh! But uh, here, take this.” He grabbed a small booklet from one of the many piles on the desk beside him and shoved it into her hands. She looked down at it and saw that it was a screened image of the Statue of Liberty painted red with the title “THE LONE GUNMAN #31: YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT: How The Government Invades Our Food.” Scully raised her eyebrows. She had read a lot of zines before, but this may have been the most interesting one so far. She thanked them and then she and Mulder shuffled out the door, which immediately shut behind them.

“Well, they were certainly an interesting cast of characters,” Scully commented, rolling up the sleeves on her jacket. When Mulder didn’t respond, she looked over at him and saw he was staring down at his loafers. She gazed down at her own shoes. “Can we go to my apartment?” he asked. Her head shot up in surprise as she looked at him with furrowed eyebrows. “Not- I mean. Is that okay? Because I just-“ He sighed. “I really want to sit down and have a chance to clear my head. And I want to talk to you. But I want to do it somewhere where we don’t have to worry about being interrupted.” Scully looked at his face, and its lines and creases that had no place on a person his age. And the pleading look in his eye. She nodded slowly. “Okay,” she said. “Let’s go.”

They walked in silence again. Scully wanted to prod him into saying something, anything, because the quiet was so unlike him. She’d rather listen to a thousand stories about aliens lurking in the atmosphere just above the campus than have him walk beside her and say nothing. But she thought it best to let him have his quiet, and clear his head like he wanted to do.

The two came to a stop outside a fairly shabby looking apartment building of faded brick with dusty windows. She followed Mulder inside and up a rickety staircase where he stopped in front of one of the doors and dug around in his pants pocket for the key. When he unlocked the door and they stood inside, Scully was able to get a good look around the combination living/kitchen/dining area. There were the staples of college student life, including the sagging couch, tiny TV, and shelves overflowing with books. She took particular notice of a poster hanging on one of the walls that depicted a silver, gleaming spaceship hovering over a clump of trees against the background of a perfectly blue sky. The thick white letters at the bottom read “I want to believe.”

Mulder took a seat on the couch and Scully hesitated, but then sat down beside him because there was no other place to. He sat there, staring into his lap and not saying anything, and Scully wondered if she should remind him why he had brought her here. But then he started to speak, still without looking up. “It was November 27th. My parents were next door, visiting with the neighbors, and I was alone with my sister, Samantha.” Mulder paused and took a deep breath. “Except we weren’t really alone. We- we were playing a game. And the TV was on and we were…we were there. And then the lights went off. The television did too. And there was this noise…this awful noise. And she was calling for me. Over and over. But I couldn’t reach her. I couldn’t stop them.” Scully sat beside him, unsure of what to say or do, unable to keep the concern out of her eyes as her heart broke for him.

“She was abducted. I know she was,” Mulder said, his voice softened. “We…I never got her back. It all…changed.” Scully bit her lip, thinking. “That’s why you’re so ready to believe,” she said before she could stop herself. He still didn’t lift his head, but instead just nodded. She reached out and put her hand on his and that finally made him gaze up at her. Scully took one look at his face and she knew. She knew why he needed her. She didn’t understand everything. But she understood enough.


End file.
